help shooting a real fire scene!?

[yordanrhapsody]

hi everybody, I'm new to this forum… I'm an experienced photographer and relatively new to videography.

 

Now I'm approaching my first serius attempt by doing a scene that describes an ancient story of the town where I live.

 

The difficult part is to realize a realistic scene that shows a small medieval town burning down to ashes.

 

For now I thought of building some walls in wood and rocks (like it was in XIII century here) and shoot the scene when they are really burning in fire, with peaple screaming and running through the town.

BUT… this is an expensive solution and my budget is really low. is possible to recreate it with some tricks and a good software?

 

any suggestions?

 

thanks

[Anonymous]

Search online for fire and smoke fx. Digital Juice probably has a pretty good selection. Use matte paintings of the buildings. Green-screen the screaming people, use a fog machine to create 'smoke' around them, and composite the whole thing in an NLE. With enough smoke (and convincingly 'choking' actors who feign blundering about) it should look pretty good. Stay with tight shots on your actors, and keep the wide shots very short. Go for chaos, and keep the audience just a bit off balance. Back it with some screams and the right music to wind up your audience, and they'll probably think you set a major fire to get the shot.

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